REPORT OF COMMITTEE 



ON 



COURSES OF STUDY AND FACULTY 



FOR THE 



ILLINOIS INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITY. 



PUBLISHED BY ORDER OF THE BOARD )F TRUSTEES 



SPRINGFIELD : 

BAKER, BATLHACHE & CO., PRINTERS. 

1867. 



REPORT OF COMMITTEE 



ON 



COURSES OF STUDY AID FACULTY 



FOE THE 



ILLINOIS INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITY. 



PUBLISHED BY ORDER OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES. 



SPKINGFIELD : 

BAKER, BAILHACHE & CO., PRINTERS. 

1867. 

X.Gr. 



EEPORT OF COMMITTEE 



ON 



COURSES OF STUDY AND FACULTY 



FOR THE 



ILLINOIS INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITY. 



'UBLISHED BY ORDER OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES. 



Inasmuch as some time mast necessarily elapse before the University 
can be properly equipped and prepared for opening, the committee 
present now, only the outlines and some of the general features of a 
plan of organization, hoping to be permitted, by fuller consultation 
with each other, and with eminent educators in other States, who are 
engage; in organizing similar institutions, to ripen their plans more 
fully i : presenting them in detail. In laying the foundations of 
an institution which is to last through coming ages, and to affect all 
future -rations, we have need to plan wisely. We must nut expose 
ourselves, .v.eedlessly, to the inconveniences of changes, nor to suspi- 
cions ol caprice. 

THE GENERAL AIMS OF THE UNIVERSITY. 

Til; of any institution necessarily control its organization. It 
shoul fitted to its uses. The great general aims of the University 
are d< m< by the statutes under which it is established. Though not 
strict! ined by law to the objects proposed in the congressional 
grant e yet bound to meet those objects fully and fairly. Accord- 
ing to mguage of the grant, "the leading object shall be, without 
exchv" her scientific and classical studies, and including military 
tactic ach such branches of learning as are related to agriculture 
and tj jhanic arts, in order to promote the liberal and practical 
educa f the industrial classes, in the several pursuits and profes- 
sions ii >." 



Or, changing the order of statement, the chief aim of the University 
is, " the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes, in the 
several pursuits and professions in life;" and in order to this end. the 
University is "to teach such branches of learning as are related to agri- 
culture and the mechanic arts, without excluding other scientific and 
classical studies, and including military tactics." The military tactics 
are required, and the scientific and classical studies are permitted. Such 
at least is the common construction of these clauses, though the lan- 
guage may not unreasonably be understood to imply that the latter 
studies shall not be excluded from the course. 

The State law evidently aims to carry out the intention of the con- 
gressional grant, and gives the trustees power " to appoint such profes- 
sors and instructors, and establish and provide for the management of 
such model farms, model art aud other departments, as may be requir- 
ed to teach, in the most thorough manner, such branches of learning as 
are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts, and military tactics, 
without excluding other scientific and classical studies." This slight 
change of the order of the language of the congressional enactment, 
gives additional emphasis to the opinion that it was intended to pro- 
hibit the exclusion of other scientific and classical studies. Under any 
construction, the Legislature evidently intended to insist — as the law 
of Congress insists — on the industrial and military education, yet ex- 
plicitly allowing the trustees to enlarge the scope of studies as they 
may see fit. 

A clearer insight into the real intention of the congressional grant 
may be gained if we call to mind that the Colleges, existing at the time 
of the passage of the act making this grant, were adapted only to lit 
men for the so-called " learned professions," and that the influence of 
these colleges tended to withdraw their students from the pursuits of 
industry. Congress therefore proposed to create a new class of col- 
leges, which should train men for industrial pursuits, and help to turn 
some portion of the great currents of educated life into the channels of 
industry. They aimed to link learning more closely to labor, and to 
bring the light of science more fully to the aid of the productive arts. 
Any other interpretation of the design of Congress than this would 
involve an absurdity. 

The Industrial College was not an expression of congressional con- 
demnation of the ordinary college, or opposition to it. A grant of a 
township of land in each new State had already provided for State 
Universities of the common sort. And besides these, rich and power- 
ful seats of learning were every where fitting men for the great public 
fields of Law, Medicine and Theology. Congress only sought to extend 
still wider the benefits of science and liberal culture. They wished to 
establish other seats of learning, equally great and equally powerful 
which should send scholars of high scientific attainments and broad 
and liberal culture, to the farms and workshops of the country. 

And finally, as it was not the object of the Industrial Colleges to 
educate simply the sons of farmers and mechanics, so it was not their 
design to teach the mere manual arts of agriculture and manufacture. 
The college course can not replace the apprenticeship in the shop or on 
the farm ; and if it could, a hundred such universities as this could 



not train to their various trades the future farmers and mechanics of 
this State. Some practice should, if possible, accompany the scientific 
study of the several arts, but the aim of this practice must be to insure 
the thorough comprehension of the principles involved. To teach the 
millions their trades, however desirable, is beyond our power. To so 
teach the few who will come and patiently complete their course, that 
they shall be thorough masters of practical science, and able in their 
turn to teach others, this is the worthy and attainable end of the 
University. 

The committee profoundly appreciate and commend the far-reaching 
wisdom and beneficence of these aims of the congressional grant, and 
would seek to carry them out to the very letter. They have discussed 
thus fully the intent of the congressional enactment, in order to brush 
aside the false impressions which may have gained currency, and to 
bring out into clearer relief this grand idea of the Industrial University, 
as it lies involved in both State and national statutes — a true University 
organized in the interest of the industrial, rather than of the profes- 
sional pursuits, and differing from other Universities in that its depart- 
ments are technological rather than professional— schools of Agricul- 
ture and Art, rather than schools of Medicine and Law. Its central 
educational courses, while equally broad and liberal, are to be selected 
to fit men for the study and mastery of the great branches of industry, 
rather than to serve as introductions to the study of law, medicine, or 
theology. , 

This broad idea of the Industrial University proceeds upon the two 
fundamental assumptions: First, that the agricultural and mechanical 
arts are the peers of any others in their dignity, importance and scien- 
tific scope : and, Second, that the thorough mastery of these arts, and 
of the sciences applicable to them, requires an education different in 
kind, but as systematic and complete as that required for the compre- 
hension of the learned professions. It thus avoids the folly of offering 
as leaders of progress in the splendid industries of the nineteenth cen- 
tury, men of meager attainments and stinted culture, and steers clear 
also of that other and absurder folly of supposing that mere common 
school boys, without any thorough discipline, can successfully master 
and apply the complicated sciences which enter into and explain the 
manifold processes of modern agriculture and mechanic art. 

Nor is it forgotten that man is something more than the artisan, and 
that manhood has duties and interests higher and grander than those 
of the workshop and the farm. Education must fit for society and citi- 
zenship, as well as for science and industry. The educated agricultu- 
rist and mechanic will not unfrequently be called to serve in Senate 
chambers and gubernatorial chairs, and will need an education broader 
and better than the simple knowledge of his art. 

The State has need every where, but especially in the center and at 
the head of the great industries on which, as on corner stones, rest 
down her material progress and power, of broad-breasted, wise-hearted, 
clear-thinking men — men of rich, deep culture, and sound education. 

And besides all this, it should be reflected that half the public value 
of a body of educated and scientific agriculturists and mechanicians 



6 

will be lost, if they lack the literary culture which will enable them to 
communicate, through the press, or by public speech, their knowledge 
and discoveries; or if they are wanting in that thorough discipline 
which will make them active and competent investigators and in venters, 
long after their school days are over. 

Nor would we forget, nor attempt by a one-sided education to 
restrain, that free movement and versatility of American life and 
genius which leads so many of our more eminent citizens to the suc- 
cessive mastery of several vocations. Let us educate for life, as well 
as for art, leaving genius free to follow its natural attractions, and lend- 
ing to talent a culture fitting it for all the emergencies of public or 
private duty. If some of our graduates shall quit, for a time, the 
harvest field for the forum, or prefer medicine to mechanic art, we shall 
hope they will demonstrate that, even in professional life, the education 
we give is neither inferior nor inadequate. And in riper years they 
will return to their first love, and bring their gathered wealth and 
honors to lay them in the lap of the agriculture and art we have taught 
them. Let the State open wide, then, this Pierian fount of learning. 
Let her bid freely all her sons to the full and unfailing flow: those 
whose thirst or whose needs are little, to what they require; those 
whose thirst and whose capacities are large, to drink their fill. Let 
the university be made worthy the great state whose name it bears; 
worthy the grand and splendid industries it seeks to promote; and 
worthy of the great century in which we live. 

DEPARTMENTS AND COURSES OF INSTRUCTION. 

Having thus defined the general idea and aims of the University, 
the Committee suggest the following enumeration of departments, 
with the courses of instruction in each : 

I. Tlie Agricultural Department — Embracing: 

1. The course in Agriculture proper. 

2. The course in Horticulture and Landscape Gardening. 

II The Polytechnic Department — Embracing : 

1. The course in Mechanical Science and Art. 

2. The course in Civil Engineering. 

3. The course in Mining and Metallurgy. 

4. The course in Architecture and Eine Arts. 

III. The Military Department — Embracing: 

1. The course in Military Engineering. 

2. The course in Military Tactics. 

IV. The Department of Chemistry and Natural Science. 

V. Tlie Department of Trade and Commerce. 

VI. The Department of General Science and Literature — Embracing: 

1. The course in Mathematics. 

2. The course in Natural History, Chemistry, etc. 

3. The course in English Language and Literature. 

4. The course in Modern Languages and Literature. 

5. The course in Ancient Languages aDd Literature. 

6. The course in History and Social Science. 

7. The course in Philosophy, Intellectual and Moral. 



It may not be found feasible to develop all these departments at the 
outset, but ultimately even others may be added to those here enume- 
rated. 

The following brief exposition of some of the principal courses will 
exhibit their general scope : 

1. The course in agriculture proper may embrace the study of 
common tillage, arboriculture, fruit growing, cattle and sheep husbandry, 
veterinarv art, agricultural chemistry, and rural engineering and archi- 
tecture. 

Its aim will be to give a practical knowledge of the various kinds of 
soils, their composition and improvement, by chemical or by mechani- 
cal treatment ; the several classes of crops, with the preparation of 
the soil, seeding, cultivation and harvesting of each ; the rotation 
of crops, and preparation and use of fertilizers ; vegetable anatomy 
and physiology, with the classification, values, and laws of growth 
and culture of the cereals, grasses, and other useful plants, together 
with general botany; fruit-growing and the several modes of propa- 
gation, and the production of new varieties; arboriculture, with the 
nature and value of the various species of ornamental, shade and 
forest trees, the propagation, growth and care of forests, their impor- 
tance and value in a prairie country, in their effects upon climate, vege- 
tation and health; animal anatomy and physiology, with a study of 
the breeds of domestic animals, and their values for the dairy, for fat- 
tening, for draught, and for wool or other products, and of the princi- 
ples ot stock-breeding ; veterinary art, with the laws of feeding, care and 
training of the domestic animals; the apiary and poultry yard ; agri- 
cultural chemistry, applied to the analysis of soils, fertilizers and food, 
etc.; entomology, especially including the useful insects, and those 
injurious to animal life; meteorology and climatology; rural architec- 
ture and engineering, embracing the planning of farm buildings, and 
the laying out, draining and fencing of farms ; political economy, the 
laws of production, consumption and markets ; real estate jurispru- 
dence, the laws regulating the tenures and transfers of land, and the 
laws relating to rural affairs ; the history of agriculture, and general 
views of the husbandry of foreign countries. To these studies should 
be added, either to prepare for the foregoing, or as necessary to com- 
plete education, courses in mathematics, language and literature, men- 
tal and moral philosophy, logic, history and science of government. 

The instruction should be partly by text-books, and partly by lec- 
tures, enforced by observation and practice in the laboratory, and the 
various departments of the experimental farm. 

2. The course of instruction in horticulture may comprehend most 
of the studies already described under the course in agriculture, omit- 
ting stock-breeding and veterinary art, and adding to the fruit-growing, 
the culture of the small fruits and culinary vegetables, and the culture 
of flowers; the construction and management of the hot- bed, the green- 
house, the grapery, the seed-plot and the nursery ; landscape garden- 
ing, the laying out and ornamentation of public and private pleasure 
grounds, parks, cemeteries, etc. The methods of instruction should be 
like those in the department of agriculture. 



8 

3. The courses in mechanics, civil engineering and mining belong 
properly to the polytechnic school. All the fundamental sciences 
involved in them being taught at the University, these courses may 
also be developed there. The committee defer the delineation of a 
course of instruction in this department till the question of the extent 
of its means of development is settled. 

4. Military tactics being specifically required by the act of Congress, 
the development of this department to such an extent as may be found 
practicable, should be undertaken at the outset. While the effect of 
this department will be to scatter through the state a body of men so 
far advanced in military art that, in case of war, they will furnish skill- 
ful officers, ready to drill and lead the volunteer forces of the country, 
it is the opinion of many experienced educators that the introduction 
of the military drill and discipline is of positive value for their educa- 
ting influence. They will materially assist in the government of the 
institution, and tend to form those habits of order and punctuality, for 
the want of which so many educated men fail of usefulness and success. 

It is strongly recommended by eminent military officers, that some 
simple and tasteful uniform be prescribed for all the students, as the 
law contemplates and provides ; that the organization partake some- 
what the military form, and that a daily drill be had in militar}^ tac- 
tics. The uniform would not be more expensive than ordinary cloth- 
ing, and its use would repress extravagances in dress, and promote a 
feeling of democratic equality among the whole body of students. It 
will help also to stimulate the virtues of personal neatness and manly 
courtesy of demeanor. 

By frequent rotations in office, and by making those eligible to office 
who merit it by proficiency in drill and by good soldierly conduct, a 
sufficient stimulus would be gained to insure attention, and both the 
faculties of obedience and command would be developed. Students of 
the first year might be required to serve in the ranks and as non-com- 
missioned officers, the higher officers being selected from the advanced 
classes. Some new drill might also be introduced for each advanced 
class, and thus the interest be sustained. 

Besides the field exercises, some elementary text books should be 
used, and the students be required to read for recitations or for exam- 
inations on the general principles of military science. 

It is hoped by the friends of military education that provision will 
soon be made by congress for the detail of competent officers of the 
army to act as professors of military science in the colleges introducing 
it, and that in this way the university may be provided with instructors 
in this department. 

5. The course in chemistry and natural science will embrace the 
study of analytical and practical chemistry, the analysis of soils, ores, 
minerals and organic bodies, and the applications of chemistry in agri- 
culture and the arts of dyeing and bleaching, and the manufacture of 
sugar, salt, glass, etc. It will embrace also the more extended and 
practical study of mineralogy, geology, and natural history in general, 
w T ith the arts of collecting and preserving specimens, and of arranging 
cabinets and conducting geological surveys. 



9 

6, The instruction in the department of trade and commerce will have 
for its aim to give students a knowledge of the principles of business, and 
of the customs and laws of trade — the collection, transportation, ex- 
change and distribution of the valuable products of nature and art. Such 
knowledge will be eminently valuable to the educated farmer, and is 
of vital necessity to those who are to be employed in the great com- 
mercial branches of industry. The crowded rooms of the commercial 
schools, meagre and unscientific as the instruction of these schools 
often is, prove conclusively the felt need of such a department of in- 
struction, and the university would be incomplete in its industrial 
courses if it should leave this important form of human industry unpro- 
vided for. 

The studies in this department, in addition to such literary studies 
as are necessary for the requisite discipline and culture, and such 
knowledge of natural sciences' as may be needful to an understanding 
of the origin, nature, quality and cost of the commodities, crude and 
manufactured, known to commerce, should embrace also political econ- 
omy, the laws of production, exchange and consumption as they affect 
markets; the theories of banking, insurance, and. foreign and domestic 
exchange ; the laws governing importation and exportation, the seve- 
ral classes of imposts, duties, etc , and the theories connected therewith ; 
commercial geography, with the staple commodities of the different 
regions and nations, their commercial condition, usages and markets; 
book-keeping in its several forms, and commercial customs, papers and 
correspondence; and finally, commercial law and the history of com- 
merce with its growths and variations. Such knowledge, while it 
would make intelligent business men, farmers, merchants and manu- 
facturers, and managers of the great business enterprises of the nation, 
would help to prevent those ruinous speculations and disastrous failures 
which spring as often from a pitiable ignorance of the great fundamen- 
tal laws of trade, as from a willful violation of them. 

DEPARTMENT OF GENERAL SCIENCE AND LITERATURE. 

The several courses in this department make up the general educa- 
tional or college course. Their main aim is to furnish such a liberal 
education as may best fit students either for the mastery of the special 
courses in the arts, or f>r the general duties of life. The final compo- 
sition and adjustment of this central course will demand the most care- 
ful consideration. The conflicting views which prevail as to relative 
values of different branches of learning, and the consequent disposition 
to scout some as useless, and to magnify others as of overshadowing 
importance, make it requisite for us to recur briefly to some fundamen- 
tal principles which ought to control our selection. 

The knowledges considered as instruments of culture or education, 
may be broadly grouped into four grand divisions, as follows : 

1. Natural sciences, or sciences of observation and experiment. 

2. Mathematics, or the science of imagination and calculation. 

3. Linguistic and philological sciences, or the sciences of formal ex- 
pression. 



10 

4. Philosophical and speculative sciences, or the sciences of con- 
sciousness and reflection. 

Each form of knowledge affects culture by two separate methods. 
First, by the kind and extent of the exercise its study affords the mind, 
and secondly, by the exciting and stimulating effect of its proper ideas. 
Some studies are chiefly valuable for the former, and others for the 
latter use. 

The natural sciences, or sciences of nature, embracing natural histo- 
ry, chemistry, natural philosophy, geology, physical geography and 
uranography, especially exercise and cultivate the powers of observa- 
tion, classification and inductive reasoning. 

The mathematical studies, embracing both pure and applied mathe- 
matics, exercise and develop the capacity to form and combine abstract 
conceptions, and cultivate the deductive reason. They also promote 
habits of mental concentration and continuity of thought. 

Linguistic studies educate the discriminative judgment, and develop 
the power both of the expression and reception of thought. They train 
also the faculty of discursive reasoning, and help to give to the mental 
action a precision and clearness not otherwise to be gained. 

The philosophical and speculative sciences, embracing mental and 
moral philosophy, and historical and social science, address themselves 
to minds already well matured, and powerfully exercise the reflective 
faculties. They especially develop the habit of looking for the funda- 
mental and essential, in facts and things; of investigating the real 
nature and causes of social and vital phenomena, and of that reasoning 
from the contingent and the probable, which goes among us by the 
name of "common sense." 

If we turn now to note the other educational force found in these sev- 
eral classes of knowledge — the stimulating power of their proper ideas — 
we shall find an equal diversity in the kind and degree of their influ- 
ence; the philosophical studies being to the majority of mature mind^, 
the most stimulating, and the matematical, the least. 

Natural science gives us a knowledge of physical facts and pheno- 
mena, and of the great forces and laws of nature underlying these. 
This knowledge has in all ages stimulated themost'eager curiosity and 
awakened the spirit of inquiry into physical causes. It has also excited 
the most wild and extravagant speculations. 

The mathematics afford us only the knowledge of the abstract relations 
of quantity and number, and of certain formulas of analysis. It is by 
its problems that this science excites the mental activities. Its ideas 
lie mostly inert in the mind, except when wanted as instruments of cal- 
culation. 

Language, like mathematics, is mainly concerned with relations ; but 
it is with the relations of ideas and thoughts in all departments of 
knowledge. The study of language is the study of the connections, as 
well as of the expression, of thought. Grammar, as J. Stuart Mill has 
justly observed, is '"incipient logic." But language is the instrument 
and the store-house, as well as the vehicle of thought. It is full of .his- 
tory, philosophy, science and poetry. It powerfully stimulates the 
thinking processes by the facilities it affords for the manufacture as 
well as the commerce of thought. 



11 

Bat no knowledge so profoundly stirs and stimulates the human mind 
as the great questions with which philosophy and history have to do. 
These questions come down to us from those great central heights of 
truth, unattainable it may be in their heaven-piercing summits, but 
still irresistibly attracting all great thinkers, and calling for the might- 
iest efforts of the human intelligence in the struggle to master their 
mysterious and still unsolved problems. 

It seems too obvious to need further argument that a true educational 
course must include these four classes of studies, and that if we would 
send forth a body of thoroughly educated agriculturists, to stand as the 
peers of the educated men found in other professions, we must give 
our students the benefits of a course with its full proportionate measure 
of each of these elements. "It is an ancient and universal observa- 
tion," said that great thinker and teacher, Sir William Hamilton, "It 
is an ancient and universal observation, that different studies cultivate 
the mind to a different development ; and as tlie end of a liberal edu- 
cation is the general and harmonious evolution of its faculties and capa- 
cities in their relative subordination, the folly has accordingly been 
long and generally denounced which would attempt to accomplish this 
result, by the partial application of certain partial studies." Testimony 
could be multiplied on this point from the world's greatest thinkers. 

It is not necessary that all the branches in each of these great classes 
of studies be included in the course. Provided that each class is rep- 
resented, in something like its due proportion, we are at liberty to select 
of two kindred studies of nearly equal disciplinary power, that one 
which most conduces to the special uses we have in view. In making 
up a course for the Industrial University, we may wisely and safely 
depart from the common college curriculum ; and, without losing any 
of its real advantages, may gain much special assistance for our indus- 
trial courses. 

STUDIES OF THE UNIVERSITY COURSE. 

In Physical Sciences, the course should embrace botany, zoology, 
mineralogy, chemistry, geology and physics, not in the stinted measure 
and nearly useless manner in which they are usually taught, but with 
such extent and thoroughness as shall give students a practical com- 
prehension and knowledge of each. The scientific farmer or mechanic 
should be a good naturalist. 

In Mathematics, besides algebra and geometry, the student of agri- 
culture needs trigonometry and land surveying ; while the mechanic and 
civil engineer require also analytical geometry, mechanics and the cal- 
culus. These studies, therefore, should find place in this general course. 

In language, the course should embrace a thorough study of our 
own language, its rhetoric and literature. 

Of Modern Languages, it should include the French and German, 
taught with such thoroughness that the student may read them with 
ease, and converse in them with some facility. The" scientific agricul- 
turist ought to be able to avail himself of the fresh discoveries of the 
French and German men of science. He is shut out from the best 
scientific thinkers of the age, and from many of the best sources of 



12 

knowledge, if he can not read the languages of France and Germany. 
And the prevalent use of these languages in our own country, among 
large masses of our population, gives to their study an additional 
value. 

The Latin language, both because it enters so largely into our own 
and other modern languages, and because it is to such an extent the 
language of science, will demand a place in the course. As an instru- 
ment of linguistic culture it greatly surpasses modern languages, and 
its literature is of perennial value. When well taught, no study more 
richly rewards the student. The Greek should be afforded, at least as 
an optional study, to all who desire to pursue it. It will never lose its 
value in the eyes of the highest grade of scholars. 

Mental and Moral Philosophy, Logic, History, Political Ecomomy, 
Civil Polity and Constitutional Law, will all properly enter into the 
course as philosophical and speculative studies, and because of their 
high practical values. 

A course, composed of these studies, reaching through four years 
will fully equal in its disciplinary power the ordinary college course, 
and be of much more value to the student of the industrial arts. 

It seems almost idle to say, we admit, many of these studies are not 
necessary to the mere practical farmer. Latin will not help a man to 
hold a plow, nor will mental philosophy teach how to fatten hogs. But 
we reiterate, the Industrial University is not needed and was not foun- 
ded for the common education of men, farmers or others. u The liberal 
and practical education" proposed by Congress will require all the 
amplitude of study here described. 

It is not insisted that all students shall take this general course, 
though it is strongly recommended. Students may take up special 
courses without stopping to complete this, just as they may take a medi- 
cal or law course at any other University, without first graduating from 
the college course. 

The special courses in Agriculture and the Arts will comprehend 
many of the studies belonging to the general course, and they may be 
so arranged that a diligent student, of good abilities, while pursuing 
the regular University course, may also take up and carry forward one 
of the special technical courses. The studies of the University course 
being the minimum of study required to entitle the student to regular 
standing ; it will be found that many students can perform successfully 
more than this minimum. 

By further arranging the special courses so as to connect them with 
the last three years of the University course, and by bringing them, 
as far as practicable, into the fall and winter session, we may com- 
ply with the provision of the law, and also allow students of Agri- 
culture or Horticulture alone, to complete their special studies in a three 
years' course. 

OPTIONAL AND SELECT COURSES. 

The opinion gathers currency that students of mature age and ex- 
perience should be permitted to enter our universities and colleges and 
select for themselves such studies as they may need, and as they are 



13 

qualified to pursue successfully with the regular classes in those studies. 
It may sometimes also occur that persons will desire to enter the uni- 
versity simply to attend some course of lectures, or to attain an insight 
into some agricultural or other industrial process, as the budding, 
grafting or pruning of trees, the management of a grapery, etc. Such 
students should be furnished with all the facilities consistent with the 
good order of the institution. 

QUALIFICATIONS FOR ADMISSION. 

The question of the qualifications required for admission to the uni- 
versity is one demanding careful consideration. These requirements 
should not be so high as to viitually exclude those who might success- 
fully pursue the courses of study, nor so low as to admit those who are 
unprepared to profit by a residence at the institution, and whose time 
would be uselessly wasted in the attempt to grasp studies beyond their 
comprehension. 

The law prescribes that "no student shall be admitted to instruc- 
tion in any of the departments of the University who shall not have 
attained to the age of fifteen years, and who shall not previously under- 
go a satisfactory examination in each of the branches ordinarily taught 
in the common schools of the State." The committee understand this 
language, not as fixing definitely the qualifications for admission, but 
only as determining their lowest limit. The trustees may require both 
a maturer age and a higher grade of scholarship, whenever in their 
estimation the interests of the State and of the University require it. 
It would certainly be better if students never entered college under 
eighteen years of age ; but the average age of those applying for ad- 
mission will doubtless be above this, without any special rule requiring 
it. Experience shows that students who enter college at a less age 
than that here indicated, are often injured by being thrown so early 
into the indiscriminate associations and powerful stimulation of college 
life. The University is the place for men rather than for mere boys. 

It seems requisite that two different sets of qualifications shall be 
prescribed ; the one for students who wish to pursue simply the studies 
of some select or partial course, and the other for candidates for the 
regular University courses. 

1. QUALIFICATIONS FOR ADMISSION TO SELECT COURSES. 

Students may properly be admitted to take some select course, on 
passing a thorough examination in the common school branches of 
reading, writing, arithmetic, geography and grammar, and on evidence 
of sufficient maturity and intelligence to pursue successfully the studies 
selected by them. 

2. ADMISSION TO REGULAR UNIVERSITY COURSES. 

While the committee would wish to open the University as widely 
as possible to the youth of the State, they can not forget that its real 
utility will depend on establishing and maintaining a high standard of 
scholarship. As it can not legally do common school work, so neither 



14 

ought it to undertake to do the work already provided for in the public 
high schools. It would prove a most sorry blunder if in our too eao-er 
desire to popularize the institution, and under pretence of bringing its 
advantages within the easy reach of all, we should create a gigantic 
and expensive high school, and, having thns consumed our means, 
should fail to make any University at all. It is absolutely essential, 
if the University is to do the higher and scientific work required of it, 
that it shall leave the preparatory work mainly, if not entirely, to the 
public high schools and academies of the State ; else it may fritter 
away its funds and its teaching forces, on the mere elementary work 
already sufficiently provided for, and leave undone all the great work 
which we ask at its hands for scientific agriculture and industrial 
arts. 

The reasonable construction of the statute is that while the Univer- 
sity shall not comprehend the ordinary common school studies, it shall 
so arrange its terms of admission that the public schools may be able 
to meet them, and that there be left no unbridged chasm between the 
body of the State school system and the University at its head. 

In the better class of public schools there are now taught, not only 
Grammar, Geography and Arithmetic, but also Algebra, Geometry, 
Natural Philosoph}", History of the United States, and Human Physi- 
ology, and in very many of them the Latin language. All these may 
properly be prescribed therefore as preparatory studies for the Univer- 
sity. They are ail so elementary in character as to come within 
the easy comprehension of students under fifteen years of age ; they 
all need to be studied as preparations for mastering the University 
course ; and they may all be successfully taught in public high schools. 
In the Latin the quality of the scholarship attained, rather than the 
quantity of the reading, may wisely be made the test, and the student 
should be admitted who can construe readily any passage in Cicero's 
Select Orations, or Yirgil's Georgics and ^Eneid. 

The preparatory course above indicated differs from that ordinarily 
prescribed for admission to colleges, in the omission of the Greek lan- 
guage, and in the extension of the requirements in mathematics and 
other studies. It is believed that this variation will not only better 
adapt the preparation to the peculiar character of the University, but 
will adjust the University much more nearly to the ordinary course of 
studies now generally taught in our public high schools. These schools 
universally teach Geometry and Algebra; but only in a few cases 
teach Greek to any great extent. The grade of scholarship required 
for admission will thus be made as high as that required at other Uni- 
versities, though made up of different elements. To make the work of 
the Industrial University thorough and complete, demands that the 
preparation for it shall be also full and sufficient. 

The argument for an elevated standard of qualifications for admission 
gains great force from the fact, that until the student has made as much 
progress as this preparatory course requires, he has not usually formed 
his purpose and tested his strength and ability to pursue a course of 
liberal or scientific study. The history of preparatory schools is full of 
proof that many of those who set out for a college course stop short of 
the college doors. Science, like scripture, has its "stony ground" hear- 



15 

ers, who at first receive the word with joy, but who, when the hot sun 
of hard study is up, wither away. If our doors must be held open to 
every half-taught youth who is seized with a sudden ambition to "go to 
the University," our halls will be flooded annually with fresh hosts of 
mere tyros, who will stay only long enough to manifest their unfitness 
for the place, and then go forth to shame the institution whose students 
they will claim to have been ; thus ruining its reputation, after helping 
to destroy or impair its usefulness. 

Among this host of short-lived "students of the Industrial Univer- 
sity" the state will look in vain for that long line of graduates — the ripe 
and scholarly leaders in her agriculture and her great industries — which 
she has hoped to see proceed annually from the university halls. 

The committee are confident that no person who properly considers 
the amount of more important work which the university has to accom- 
plish, will wish to see its forces diverted to the reaching of these ele- 
mentary branches which the high schools may properly claim as their 
own ground ; and certainly no one who desires the success of the uni- 
versity, as a great scientific and industrial college, will wish to see 
students entering its classes with less preparation than is here pre- 
scribed. 

It needs to be repeated that this does not forbid students of suitable 
maturity and experience to come to the university to take a few select 
studies, without passing an examination in Latin and the higher mathe- 
matics named. 

HONORARY SCHOLARSHIPS. 

The law for the organization of the university provides that " each 
county in the state shall be entitled to one honorary scholarship in the 
university, for the benefit of the descendants of soldiers and seamen 
who served in the armies and navies of the United States during the 
late rebellion ; preference being given to the children of such soldiers 
and seaman as are deceased or disabled ; and the board of trustees may 
from time to time add to the number of honorary scholarships when, in 
their judgment, such additions will not embarrass the finances of the 
university; nor need these additions be confined to the descendants of 
soldiers or seamen. Such scholarships to be filled by transfer from the 
common schools of said county of such pupils as shall, upon public ex- 
amination, to be conducted as the board of trustees of the university 
may determine, be decided to have attained the greatest proficiency in 
the branches of learning usually taught in the common schools, and who 
shall be of good moral character and not less than fifteen years of age." 
These scholarships entitle the incumbents to free tuition for three years. 

The committee recommend that the Regent, in connection with the 
Superintendent of Public Instruction, prepare examination papers, and 
transmit the same to the county superintendent of schools in each 
county, who, with other examiners, appointed by the Regent and Super- 
intendent, will see that the examinations are properly conducted, and 
will return the papers, with the written answers of the several candi- 
dates and with such testimonials as they may present, to the Regent, 
who shall determine on the papers and notify the successful candidates 
of their appointment. 



16 

A competitive examination, thus uniform in character and thus fairly 
conducted, can not but react with a most healthful stimulation upon the 
public school interests of the state ; and this stimulation will be in- 
creased by a publication of the names of the schools in which the suc- 
cessful candidates were prepared, and the teachers by whom they were 
taught. In case any counties shall neglect to send students on their 
scholarships, the Regent may be authorized to award such scholarships, 
for the year, to suitable candidates from other counties. 

CHARGES FOE TUITION, AND OTHER EXPENSES. 

The committee would rejoice if the condition of our funds and the 
provisions of the law would permit the University to be made free to 
all citizens of the State, and they cordially recommend that its tuition 
be made thus free at the earliest practicable moment ; and that from the 
outset the charges be made as light as as consistent with justice to the 
institution itself. 

The charges in American Colleges range from a few dollars per 
annum to several hundreds. In Yale College the annual fees amount 
to $85. The annual fees at Harvard are $133. At the Michigan Uni- 
versity each student pays a matriculation fee of $10, and an annual fee 
of $5. At the Michigan Agricultural College the tuition is free for 
citizens of the State. Students from other States pay $20 per annum. 
All students pay a matriculation fee of $5. The proposed fees for the 
Cornell University are $20 a year for tuition; matriculation fee $15. 

The committee recommend that the academic year be divided into 
two semi-annual sessions, as nearly equal as may be, and that the tui- 
tion and other fees for each session be fixed at the following rates : 

For tuition to students from other States, $10 per terra $20 per annum 

For incidentals, care and warming of public rooms, etc., $5 per term. . ..10 " " 
For room rent, $6 per term 12 " " 

They recommend, also, that a matriculation fee of $10 be charged to 
each student on first entering the institution. This fee is never charged 
a second time, but once paid, entitles the student to all the privile- 
ges of membership at any time thereafter. 

Students on the " honorary scholarships " will pay the matriculation 
fee and charges for room rent and incidentals, but will be charged noth- 
ing for tuition. 

BOARDING DEPARTMENT. 

The building is provided with the necessary rooms for a boarding 
department. It is believed that in a short time we may wholly dis- 
pense with this department, even if it must be opened at the outset. 
Suitable boarding houses will doubtless soon spring up in the neighbor- 
hood, and the rooms in the University building may be appropriated 
to more public and proper uses. 

students' rooms. 

There are in the University buildings sixty-six rooms designed for 
students' dormitories, each dormitory being calculated to accommodate 



n 

two students. These rooms are without furniture. It is customary to 
leave students to provide their own furniture, as they will ordinarily 
take better care of their own property than they will of that belonging 
to a public institution. 

MANUAL LABOR SYSTEM. 

One of the most important and difficult questions concerning the 
organization of the University is that of the introduction of the manual 
labor system. It is true that the attempt to connect manual labor with 
schools has in many instances failed ; but the nature and extent of this 
failure have not been generally understood. It has not failed because 
the students were unwilling to work, nor because the work was injuri- 
ous either to their health or culture. It has simply failed to pay. The 
labor of students was found unprofitable. 

The high success and utility of the labor system, as practiced at the 
Michigan Agricultural College, has, in the minds of your committee, 
fully demonstrated its feasibility and value ; and they would heartily 
recommend its adoption here, provided similar conditions can be 
secured. There, each student is required by law to work three hours 
a day, unless excused on account of sickness. The professors accom- 
pany the students to the garden or field, and participate in and direct 
the work, which is made to illustrate the principles taught in the lecture 
rooms. Wages, according to the value of the work done, not exceeding 
seven and a-half cents an hour, are allowed the student, and he is thus 
enabled to pay a considerable part of the expense of his schooling by 
his labor. Even there the work has never yet proved remunerative to 
the institution, though it annually approaches nearer this result. 

It should be added that the manual labor system, as practiced at the 
above named institution, has been carefully inspected by gentlemen 
sent from several of the eastern States, and has been warmly commen- 
ded in their published reports, as eminently satisfactory and successful. 

The chief advantages of the labor system are these : 

1. It promotes the physical health and development of the student. 

2. It cultivates habits of industry, and, keeping the student inured to 
muscular effort, renders his return to the farm, or other physical labor, 
natural and easy. This is a point of much importance, if we wish 
successfully to turn the tides of educated life into the industrial 
employments. 

3. When made, as in the agricultural course, to bear upon the 
studies pursued, it creates a practical interest" in, and comprehension of, 
those studies which cannot be obtained by mere abstract study. 

4. When pursued, as here recommended, in the society of intelli- 
gent class mates and teachers, and lighted with a knowledge of the 
reason of every process, it is not only pleasant, but comes to be seen 
as noble and dignified ; and thus the sentiment of honor to labor is 
deeply implanted in the mind. 

5. It aids the student to pay his own way, and cultivates in him 
the feeling of manly independence. 

These considerations are so important that they incline us to recom- 
mend its introduction, even though it should fail to pay all the expenses 
attending it. But, if proper care is taken not to establish too high a 
—2 



18 

rate of compensation, the Committee are not without hope that no loss 
need result, even if no profit is gained. 

APPARATUS OP ILLUSTRATION AND INSTRUCTION. 

Each department in the University will require, besides the general 
cabinets or collections, some means of illustration and instruction pecu- 
liar to itself. For general study of the natural sciences there will be 
needed full and well classified collections of specimens in mineralogy 
and geology, in botany and in the various branches of zoology. 

The departments of agriculture and horticulture will require in addi- 
tion, cabinets of seeds, grasses, grains and fruits ; models or drawings 
of farming and garden implements, of farm buildings, and plans of 
farms, gardens, celebrated parks, and landscape gardens, etc.; and spe- 
cimensand drawings of various breeds of domestic animals. 

The department of mechanics and civil engineering, will demand a 
cabinet of models and drawings of machinery, architectural plans, 
plans of roads, bridges and other structures, and specimens of building 
materials, as the various woods, marbles, granites and more common 
building stones. 

The military department will require its specimens or drawings of 
the various kinds of arms and military structures, together with plans 
of celebrated battle-fields, sieges, encampments, etc. 

The department of fine arts will require casts, photographs or en- 
gravings of the great master-pieces in art, Xhese may be obtained at 
reasonable rates, and original drawings, paintings and sculptures will, 
in due time be added. The healthful, refining and stimulating influ- 
ence of such collections on the ininds of the young, must be seen to be 
properly appreciated. 

The common working apparatus of instruction must embrace a good 
set of chemical and philosophical apparatus. The prominence due to 
chemistry in such an institution as this, will demand, at the earliest 
practicable day, a separate and suitable building for a chemical labora- 
tory, such as exists at Harvard, Yale and Amherst, and at the Michigan 
University. 

The experimental farms, orchards and gardens, with the several 
stock barns, yards, pens, etc.; the mechanic shops, tools and machinery; 
the military arms and parade grounds ; the engineer's tools, and the 
model counting house, will furnish the fitting apparatus for teaching in 
the several leading departments of special instruction. 

As the collection of cabinets is a work of years, it is important that 
it begin at once, and that applications for duplicate specimens, casts, etc., 
be made as early as practicable, wherever they may be obtained. The 
friends of the University in the various sections of the State would 
doubtless donate many specimens, if a brief circular, containing a state- 
ment of our wants, and instructions for packing and forwarding, were 
sent out. 

FACULTY. 

The committee were also instructed "to suggest a faculty- 5 for the 
University. In the entire work of organizing the institution, there is 



19 

Ho more difficult or important part than this, On the character and 
ability of its faculty, will the character and success of the University 
depend, more than upon all other circumstances taken together. 
Buildings, cabinets, libraries and rich endowments will be all in vain, 
if the living agents — the professors — be not men of ripe attainments, 
fine culture and eminent teaching powers. 

Numerous applications have already flowed in upon the committee, but 
the time has been quite too brief, since the last meeting of the board, 
to allow any such careful and extensive inquiries as would justify the 
committee in presenting any names at this time. Self-nominated can- 
didates will always be abundant, but the men we want will need to be 
sought for as with lighted candles. The incumbent of a professor's 
chair should be no ordinary man. In this, its chief seat of learning, in 
which it proposes to provide for the highest education of its sons, and 
from which, as a great center of science, it seeks to diffuse light to all 
the great fields of its industries, the State needs men of the highest type 
as scholars and as men. The qualifications of every candidate for a 
professorship must be rigidly scrutinized without fear or favor ; and 
none but men of tried and proven ability must be admitted to a place. 
Older and ordinary colleges may do with second rate men ; this Uni- 
versity can only succeed with the best men. 

A good college professor should have the three-fold qualification of 
eminent and extensive scholarship, at least in his department ; 
thoroughly tested ability to teach ; and high-toned, gentlemanly char- 
acter and culture. The first two are indispensable qualifications ; the 
third will never be overlooked by those who have marked how inevi- 
tably and ineffaceably the teacher impresses his manners and habits 
upon his pupils. If culture is the better part of education, high-toned 
character and genuine courtesy of manner and feeling are the better 
part of culture. 

The number of professors must depend upon the extent of the en- 
dowments and the consequent ability to pay salaries. Until the trus- 
tees shall determine upon the disposition of the land . scrip, and thus 
approximately determine the prospective extent of its funds, this ques- 
tion of the numerical force of the faculty must remain unsettled. 

The corps of instruction may properly embrace four classes of teach- 
ers : 1st. Professors, or principal instructors in each department of 
study. 2d. Assistant Professors —younger, or less accomplished teach- 
ers, employed in sub-departments, or to aid in departments in which the 
work cannot be fully done by one man. 3d. Lecturers, or non-resident 
Professors — men eminent in some specialty of art or science, who may 
be employed to visit the University at specified seasons, and give 
courses of lectures. 4th. Tutors, or young men, employed temporarily . 
to give instruction in the more elementary studies. 

The committee would indicate the following as among the more 
important departments or chairs of instruction : 

1. The Professorship of Practical and Theoretical Agriculture. 

2. ' ' ' ' of Horticulture. 

3. ' ' of Analytical and Practical Mechanics. 

4. ' ' " of Military Tactics and Engineering. 

5. ' ' ' ' of Civil Engineering. 

6. ' ' * ' of Botany and Vegetable Physiology. 



20 

7. The Professorship of Zoology and Animal Physiology. 

8. ' ' ' ' of Mathematics. 

9. " " of Chemistry. 

10. ' ' ' ' of Geology, Mineralogy and Physical Geography. 

11. '' " of English Language and Literature. 

12. ' ' ' ' of Modern Languages. 

13. ' ' ' ' of Ancient Languages. 

14. ' ' ' ' of History and Social Science. 

15. ' ' " of Mental and Moral Philosophy. 

In addition to these, the committee would suggest the following lee 



•r .*? 



tureships : 

1. The Lectureship of Veterinary Science. 

2. " ' ' of Commercial Science. 

3. ' ' of Human Anatomy, Physiology and Hygiene. 

4. " ' ' of Constitutional, Commercial and Rural Law. 

Several of these departments may, at the outset, be represented by 
the same man. The professor of botany may also be professor of 
horticulture ; and the professor of zoology may fill, likewise, the chair 
of practical agriculture. Civil and military engineering may be united 
in one chair ; and the professor of chemistry may teach also miner- 
alogy or meteorology. 

The professor of Practical Agriculture should be the superintendent 
of the experimental farm, with such foremen and other laborers under 
him as may be necessary to carry out his plans. The farm is his labora- 
tory and apparatus of instruction, by which he illustrates the scientific 
principles and theories which he teaches, and demonstrates both the 
truth and the value of his doctrines. His plans for the treatment of 
each field and crop, and for the several experiments to be tried, should 
be submitted to the Regent and Faculty, and after careful discussion 
and final adoption by them, or by the Executive committee, should be 
put on record as the settled plan for that season, to be carried out under 
the careful supervision of the superintendent, and its progress and re- 
sults fully recorded in the farm record. 

In like manner, the professor of Horticulture should be superintend- 
ent of the gardens and ornamental grounds, and should, in the same 
way, present to the Faculty for their discussion and approval, his plans 
for the management of such grounds and gardens. He, too, when 
necessary, may be aided in his work by a foreman and other laborers. 
The students, in their labors in the gardens or on the farm, will be under 
the guidance of the professors whose instructions those labors are de- 
signed to illustrate and apply ; and thus the lecture room and the field 
practice will teach the same truths, and throw upon each other the 
light of a mutual illustration. 

• The professor of Mechanics may have under his care such shops as 
may be needed on the grounds for purposes of repairs, or of such new 
constructions of any kind as may be easily made. "With a small steam 
or caloric engine as a motor power, there may be run a variety of com- 
mon machinery, such as the turning lathe, circular saws, mills for grind- 
ing feed, etc., and threshing and other machines, which will enable the 
instructor in this department to furnish practical illustration of the 
principles of mechanics. The truth taught to the eye is much more 
easily understood and remembered than that which is stated in mere 



21 

words. Every where the practical methods should supplement and 
impress the theoretical instruction. 

At the Michigan Agricultural College the students repair the farm 
tools and make many of them. Several important improvements in 
fanning implements have already originated there, though they have, 
as yet, no fully provided mechanical department. Students are also 
employed in the erection of new buildings as they are needed, and they 
are said to soon excel common workmen in the excellence of their work. 

CONCLUSION. 

In presenting this preliminary report, the committee purposely hold 
in reserve several points of much interest and importance, which they 
hope to be able to present finally in a much more definite and satis- 
factory form than can be done with the information now in hand. Ma- 
turer consideration than the time now allowed them has permitted, 
may also lead to some modification of certain of the points here pre- 
sented. 

Fully comprehending the great magnitude and the immeasurable 
importance of the enterprise which they are seeking to shape into life 
and power, they can only bespeak for it the wise support and the just 
forbearance of all good and intelligent citizens. 

An industrial university such as we are planning is, in a large part, 
without precedent or example. The field of its labors is as yet almost 
untracked in its widest stretches. The very classes for whom its bene- 
fits are designed, are as yet not half persuaded of the importance and 
real value of those benefits. The farmers and mechanics, accustomed 
to regard higher education as needful and desirable only for profession- 
al men, and almost wholly incredulous as to the utility of science in 
its applications to their work, will look with slow-coming faith upon a 
university which proposes to make farming a scientific employment, 
and to lift mechanics into a learned profession. They have, in many 
cases, yet to be convinced that a highly cultured mind may be linked 
to a brawny hand, and that a classical scholar may feel at home in a 
workshop ; aye ! and find use for all his scholarship and taste in the 
successful practice of his art. 

But the age is propitious. The working masses of mankind are 
waking to their needs, and calling for light. The thunder of the- ma- 
chinery by the side of which they toil, and the magic power of the new 
processes of arts which they daily employ, have roused the long slum- 
bering power of thought. Brains are coming into use and honor in all 
the fields of human labor, and brains will speedily demand light and 
knowledge. In an age of learning, the farmer and the mechanic will 
soon come to covet the rich heritages of science for their sons. Already 
the children of the laboring classes are crowding the public high 
schools. They will not stop there. The University lies the next step 
beyond. They will crowd to its doors ; and soon will begin to issue 
from its halls that long column, with its yearly additions, of graduates 
with broad brows, and science-lighted brains, bearing back to the farms 
and the workshops an intelligent skill and power, to invoke new and 
unwonted fruitfulness from the soil and from the mechanic's art. "If 



22 

t had fifty sous," said a farmer who had reluctantly perm itted h 
eldest boy to take a course at an agricultural college, and now brought 
his youngest to the same college, "If I had fifty sons they should all 
go to this college, for my boy, who graduated here, farms so much better 
than I ever did, skillful as I thought myself, that he is getting rich 
from his half of the crops he raises on my land, and I live like a prince 
on the remainder." 

And the light of high and classic learning will be found as beautiful 
and becoming when it shines in an educated farmer's home, as when it 
gilds the residence of the graduated lawyer or physician. Rich libra- 
rii s are already seen in the houses of some of our leading agricultu- 
rists, and no one has found that they hinder the growth of harvests, or 
unfit the hand of the reaper. "When our Industrial University shall 
have come fully into its work, these libraries will be increased in num- 
ber, and there will gather around the firesides in our farm houses, and 
in the homes of our master mechanics, groups of cultivated and intelli- 
gent people, the peers in knowledge, refinement and power of the best 
and bravest in the land. 

And what richer growths shall yet start from these magnificent prairies 
to repay the farmer's toil, and what more splendid achievements shall 
yet spring from our myriad-handed mechanic art — what more beautiful 
bloom in our gardens, and more delicious fruits from our orchards — 
what more tasteful and convenient homes from our architecture, and 
what grander and more abundant products from our multiplying man- 
ufactories — what nobler forms of civilization to grace our free institu- 
tion, and what better types of manhood to tell of the blessings of lib- 
erty and learning, when education shall have fully achieved this last 
triumph, and carried her victorious banner of light down into the fields 
where the toiling millions of mankind must still, by the stern but bene- 
ficent ordination of Heaven, "eat their bread in the sweat of their 
brows." 

J. M. GREGORY, ] 

NEWTON BATEMAN, | 
MASON BRAYMAN, V Committee. 
S. S. HAYES, | 

WILLARD C. FLAGG, I 



Note. — For circulars, or information concerning the University, ap- 
ply to 

J. M. GREGORY, 

L. OT C Champaign, Champaign county, Illinois. 



Note.— TIME OF OPENING. 



It was the earnest desire both of the Trustees and of the Regent 
to open the University for students, as early at least as next September; 
but a careful consideration of the character and extent of the prepara- 
tions necessary to be made, in order to the successful inauguration of 
an enterprize of such magnitude and importance, convinced the Board 
of the necessity of some delay. It was accordingly voted that the 
opening be deferred till the first Monday in March, 1868. 

It was found that important alterations were needed to be made in 
the University building, requiring several months for their completion ; 
the University grounds, which are a portion of an open and unsettled 
prairie, were to be graded, and this grading will leave the soil naked, 
to be turned into an expanse of mud by the autumnal rains ; fences were 
to be built, walks laid, sewers constructed, out houses erected, black- 
boards and other apparatus and furniture to be made or purchased, and 
the institution to be equipped for service. 

Financial considerations of much importance also forbade haste. The 
sale of the scrip, which could not be made for several weeks, was 
uncertain. No interest would accrue on the funds till the first of May, 
1868, and the expense of the repairs and equipments, together with 
nearly the entire amount for salaries and current expenses would have 
to be taken from the principal of the University fund, thus seriously 
diminishing the means needed for the permanent support of the insti- 
tution. 

But even if these difficulties could be overcome or safely submitted 
to, the selection of a faculty could not be wisely made in a time so lim- 
ited. To ripen the working plans, to select and appoint a suitable fac- 
ulty, to allow the professors, when chosen, time to close their present en- 
gagements, and to remove their families and effects to the seat of the 
University, to properly advertise the opening, and to diffuse every where 
through the state clear and definite information of the proposed courses 
of instruction and conditions of admission, to carry out the plan for 
the examintion of candidates for the honorary scholarships ; and to do 
all this well and thoroughly, required much more time than could be 
gained in a single summer. In an institution which is to last through 
ages, the delay of six months in the opening is of little consequence if 
it avails to make that opening successful and auspicious. 

It was believed that the opportunity afforded by this delay to the 
Regent to visit the different counties of the state, and by public ad- 
dresses and personal interviews, to diffuse information concerning the 
plans and purposes of the University, would pave the way for a much 
more successful inauguration of its career. 



NOV 30 1900 



LIBRARY OF 



CONGRESS 



028 346 238 9 



